


Of A Feather

by leiascully



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Feathers & Featherplay, M/M, Wings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-24
Updated: 2019-07-24
Packaged: 2020-07-12 15:01:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,267
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19948111
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leiascully/pseuds/leiascully
Summary: Aziraphale loses a feather; not all is as it should be.





	Of A Feather

**Author's Note:**

> Timeline: post-series  
> Author's note: I'm expecting this one to have some kinkier sequels. It seems inevitable.  
> Disclaimer: No profit is made from this work and no infringement is intended.

Crowley stooped to retrieve a feather from the floor between the shelves in the bookshop. A covert, he decided, not one of the big flight feathers from the edge of the wing. He smoothed it with his fingers and went to slip it in his pocket, but then peered at it more closely. He glanced around to make sure no one else was around and then lifted his sunglasses to get a better look.

"Angel?" he called.

"Yes, my dear?" Aziraphale said, appearing around the end of the shelf with a book in his hand.

"Is this yours?" Crowley proffered the feather.

"I would assume so," Aziraphale said, taking the feather. "It's a bit wan to be one of yours."

"Look again," Crowley said. 

Aziraphale held up the feather so that it caught the light. "Yes, it's...oh."

"Exactly," Crowley said. 

"It's not entirely white," Aziraphale said slowly. 

They crowded around the feather. Most of it was the usual snowy white, but toward the quill, the barbs faded almost imperceptibly into a pale grey.

"It should be white," Aziraphale said. There was a slight frantic note in his voice. "Why isn't it white?"

"Have you looked at your wings lately?" Crowley asked.

"Well, no," Aziraphale said. "They're awkward with the shelves."

"Is there anyone here?" Crowley asked.

"Mysteriously they've all decided to leave," Aziraphale said. 

"It's a miracle," Crowley said dryly. "On you go. Let's see them."

Aziraphale stood in the middle of the shop and manifested his wings, their full span magnificent in the shifting sunbeams that glinted through the windows. Crowley took a moment to admire them. His had looked like that once, like a field of snow under the moon. 

"White," he proclaimed. 

"Perhaps the other feather got dusty on the floor?" Aziraphale said anxiously. "I've got a whole box of them somewhere. We could compare them." 

"Hang on," Crowley said in a voice he hoped was soothing. He'd collected a number of Aziraphale's feathers over the years, usually the ones dropped at inopportune moments. Each and every one had been stark white from umbilicus to tip and both of them knew it. He stroked the flight feathers, smoothing them into place. Aziraphale sighed with pleasure even as he fretted over his lost feather, trying to wipe it clean on his waistcoat. Crowley worked his way over both wings, making sure each feather was where it ought to be, each vane pristine. 

"You're very kind to me, dear boy," Aziraphale said over his shoulder.

"Don't tell anyone," Crowley said gruffly. "I have a reputation to maintain."

"Absolutely, mum's the word," Aziraphale said. He mimed locking his mouth and tossing away the key, but he couldn't keep himself from smiling. Crowley scowled back happily. The texture of Aziraphale's feathers made the tips of his fingers tingle as he stroked them, or maybe it was the divinity. He'd touched Aziraphale's body any number of times by this point, in ways that could only be described in polite company (which Aziraphale was markedly not, to his surprise and delight) as shockingly intimate and never felt quite the same frisson, but the wings didn't exactly come standard on the run-of-the-mill human body (which Crowley might have argued that Aziraphale's was not, but their earthly vessels were, to some extent, ordinary flesh and blood). The wings were ethereal, or celestial, or otherwise not of this Earth. He worked his way out to the edges of them while Aziraphale tried not to make pleased little noises. White, white, white, except at the trailing edge, there was a smudge. Crowley lifted the primary feathers gently. Near the skin, every single feather was faintly grey. 

"It might be a shadow," Crowley said, and Aziraphale mutely snapped light into existence. Crowley looked closer. 

"The flight feathers are all grey at the bottom," he reported. "And some of the little downy ones are entirely grey." He brushed them with his fingertips. They were as soft as ever.

"What does it mean?" Aziraphale asked.

Crowley shrugged. "Your guess is as good as mine."

"Are they dirty? Should I wash them? I've never washed them before," Aziraphale said, nearly wittering. "Birds take dust baths, don't they, for their feathers? I'd rather have a bath with bubbles in it, or maybe I should swim in the sea?" 

"Maybe you're just getting on in years," Crowley said. "I mean, we've existed since forever. Maybe it just happens after however many thousand years. Who'd be around to warn us?"

"If I'm going grey, then you are too," Aziraphale snapped.

Crowley smirked. "Nah, don't think so."

"Have you checked?" Aziraphale said in an ominous tone.

"I think you'll find that my wings are as dark as your average moonless night," Crowley said smugly. "In the countryside. Not in London. Obviously. Whatever, they're deepest ebon, et cetera."

"Let me see them, then," Aziraphale said, sounding like a headmaster.

"I like it when you get bossy, angel," Crowley said, and snapped his wings open.

Aziraphale gasped, his hand over his mouth. 

"Grey?" Crowley asked with sudden anxiety.

"No," Aziraphale said, letting his hand drift slowly down. "Not exactly. You rather look like Jackson Pollock had a go at you."

"I what?" Crowley demanded, ripping off his glasses and craning his neck to look. His once immaculately black wings (well, once immaculately white and then immaculately black, after a very thorough singeing) were spattered with white.

"It looks like a cream pie exploded all over you," Aziraphale said.

"That's not what it looks like," Crowley said, giving him a meaningful look. "Unless that was whipped cream the other night."

Aziraphale had the good grace to blush. "Well. I thought you liked it."

"I did," Crowley said. "But I didn't know the effect was permanent."

Aziraphale gasped. "You don't think...?"

"Don't be ridiculous," Crowley said. "If that were the case, I'm sure your wings would have more than just a gentle tinge of grey. You've had plenty of wickedness in you the past few months, if you take my meaning."

Aziraphale blushed darker. "Perhaps you're right."

"Maybe it's a brand," Crowley suggested. "Something to mark us apart from the others now that they know we're on our own side."

"Maybe it was the hellfire and the holy water," Aziraphale suggested. "Some sort of delayed reaction? I don't remember if I've shed any feathers since. I suppose it's possible I might not have noticed."

"All very plausible," Crowley said. "All very mysterious."

"Ineffable, one might say," Aziraphale murmured.

Crowley shot him a look. "You think the Almighty took a break from her busy eternity to give us a quick dye job? And coordinated it with Lucifer?"

Aziraphale shrugged. "She works in mysterious ways."

"It doesn't look bad," Crowley said. "You can't even see it unless you look hard, and then it's kind of an ombré effect. Very stylish, I hear."

"Yours is less subtle," Aziraphale said. "But it does look nice, once one gets used to it. Distinctive."

"If it is to mark us apart," Crowley said slowly, "that's, well, it's sort of...ugh, I hate to say it."

"Nice?" Aziraphale suggested.

"Yes, nice," Crowley ground out. "Shows we belong to each other instead of them, doesn't it? Whatever the intent was, that's the end result."

"I suppose it does," Aziraphale said. "That is nice." He beamed. "I nearly hope it spreads, now."

"Maybe in another six thousand years, we'll both have gone completely grey," Crowley suggested.

"My dear boy, I look forward to finding out," Aziraphale said, with a smile so absolutely soggy with love that Crowley had to kiss it off his face.


End file.
